Text-messaging Volume of iPhone Owners Declining Sharply in Finland

Between October 2011 and August 2012, SMS consumption among Finnish iPhone users dropped by 14%. During the same time span, mobile data usage grew by 68%. This supports the theory that iPhone is particularly effective at undermining traditional text-messaging.

European SMS volume trends have diverged over the past couple of years. Text-messaging volumes in countries like Spain and Netherlands have started falling steeply, while volumes continued rising during 2011 in countries like France and Finland.

There is a wide variety of reasons for how SMS volumes trend in individual countries. In Spain, the brutal financial crisis may be one major factor driving consumers to adopt cheaper alternatives for text-messaging. In Netherlands, the unusually high pricing of text-messaging services drove strong early adoption of WhatsApp messaging service. And in Finland, the unusually low number of iPhone owners may have extended the growth of traditional text-messaging in 2011. However, the number of iPhone owners is now growing rapidly in Finland as the former Symbian stronghold starts to converge with the rest of Europe.

The data from Finnish iPhone owners using Ratemizer, a new iPhone application, gives us a rare glimpse into how the SMS usage of iPhone owners has changed over the past year. Ratemizer evaluates the voice minute, SMS and mobile data consumption of its users and helps them find the cheapest possible plan fitting that usage profile.

SMS Volume Among Finnish iPhone Users

From October 2011 through August 2012, the average SMS volume of 400 Finnish iPhone users randomly selected for the survey declined by 14%. From the November peak of 111 text-messages, the volume dropped to 89 text-messages in August 2012. It’s worth noting that December was not the peak month despite the Nordic tradition of sending a flood of text-messages to friends on Christmas Eve and New Year. It seems that this tradition is already fading among iPhone users who are switching to Facebook, Twitter and WhatsApp.

At the same time, the mobile data consumption increased by 68%. This mobile data growth number is roughly in line with overall mobile data growth among all smartphone users in Europe. But the 14% decline is notably steep considering that SMS usage among all mobile subscribers in Finland still grew in 2011. It’s quite likely that as iPhone usage grows in Europe, it will hasten the gradual erosion of text-messaging.